


Oxygen Level Critical

by MightyKell



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, Angst and Feels, Explosions, Fighting, Five Plus One, Gen, Heavy Angst, Hurt No Comfort, Langst, M/M, Near Death Experiences
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-11
Updated: 2019-01-11
Packaged: 2019-10-08 08:15:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,745
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17382962
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MightyKell/pseuds/MightyKell
Summary: He made it.He made it!Lance had slowly read over the words, and then reread them, and then once again rereading them before his twin sister Rachel demanded he read the letter out loud. They were sat in their room, glow in the dark stars giving off a faint light while Lance's face slowly began to spread, his lips quirking up into a large smile. He had began to read the letter out loud, but truly only got as far as, "Dear Mr. McClain, Congratulations" before Rachel screamed and pounced forward, gripping Lance tightly in her arms.





	Oxygen Level Critical

**Author's Note:**

> Once my good pal Lance was being sending angst ideas while I was sad. 
> 
> This was the result.

Lance chuckled weakly to himself, staring out at the vast expanse of space before him.

 **Oxygen level critical.**  His suit showed him. His eyes blurred the text, struggling to focus on the precious information that his visor was trying to tell him.

It was almost ironic in a way, in all the ways that Lance had thought he would die he surprisingly has never pictured he would from suffocation while floating aimlessly in space without his lion or any of his team.

He closed his eyes, anything to stop the haziness of his vision and listened to the only sounds that he had with him, the sounds of his own shallow breathing as his lungs desperately ached to take in whatever oxygen he had left.

*~*

The first time Lance had almost died had been when he was young. He honestly couldn't remember most of the whole event due to how young he had been when it happened, but his mamá made sure to remind him consistently.

"Alejandro I was so scared!" He can remember her saying, scooping him up into her warm, safe embrace while he was still struggling to breathe.

He coughed, water seemingly continuously coming from within his small body. His form was trembling from the cold even though his moms arms were so so warm.

"Mamá I'm fine." Lance spoke, his voice raspy and rough. He pulled back slightly and looked up at his mom face. She shot him a watery smile, her chocolate brown eyes locking with his own blue as tears began to form once again.

"Alejandro never go into the ocean without telling someone ever again." Lance opened his mouth to argue but one swift look from his mom made his close it. "You may be a strong swimmer mijo, but I still want you to be safe." 

Lance pouted, his lower lip sticking out slightly while he looked at his mother. His blue eyes watering slightly as the air further irritated the salt-linden eyes. He let out a breath of air before greedily sucking some back into his tiny frame. He blinked, looking at his mother and moving closer to her, melting into her warm embrace.

*~*

The second time he hadn't even realized he was in any danger.

The previous night he had finally,  _finally_  gotten a letter back about his application into the Galaxy Garrison.

He made it.

**_He_ ** _made it!_

Lance had slowly read over the words, and then reread them, and then once again rereading them before his twin sister Rachel demanded he read the letter out loud. They were sat in their room, glow in the dark stars giving off a faint light while Lance's face slowly began to spread, his lips quirking up into a large smile. He had began to read the letter out loud, but truly only got as far as, "Dear Mr. McClain, Congratulations" before Rachel screamed and pounced forward, gripping Lance tightly in her arms.

Lance was smiling widely, and without his permission laughter began to flow from his lips. Rachel was a mess, happy tears streaming down her face while she continued to scream in rapid fire Spanish. By this point the rest of his family had slowly edged into his room, watching the twins embracing while laughing and crying. It was then that Marcos (his older brother) noticed the abandoned Galaxy Garrison letter. A quick yell was enough to clue Lance in on the fact that the rest of his family now knew of his acceptance. Suddenly Lance was surrounded by warmth, his family hugging him and each other on all sides.

This is what happiness felt like.

And then he was alone, away from the familiar warmth of his family. He was standing along the cliff-side near his house, overlooking the Veradero beach. It all felt too surreal, almost as if life was moving too fast. Just yesterday he was preparing for rejection from his dream, and somehow he conned his way in with the best of the best.

He looked up at the sky, taking in the stars above him and he smiled widely once again. 'I always wanted to see the stars.' He thought to himself, smilingly widely up at the cosmos.

"I'm going to be an astroexplorer." He whispered out loud, as if it was just a secret between him and the stars. His blue eyes reflected that of the cosmos overhead, eyes drowning in shades of blues and purples, pale lights shining directly over him.

He jumped up, still smiling and begins to scream, "I'M GOING TO BE AN ASTROEXPLOR-" he cut himself off as he felt his momentum shift, and the world began to tilt on its axis. He could feel something wrapped around his foot and he felt himself pitch forward.

"Oh no, oh no oh shit shit shit!" Lance exclaimed, trying to to swing himself back but it wasn't going to work. He landed, upper body thrown over the side of the cliff. His hands scrubbed the cliff side, desperately trying to find purchase before his top-heaviness dragged him down the drop. Lance froze, starring wide-eyed as he looked upon the steep drop.

He slowly began to slowly inch his body backwards, heart thrumming loudly in his ears as he pushed his hands shakily against the cliff. He slowly wiggled his hips, slowly but surely inching himself back to the flat surface.

Once he was back on solid ground he his body slowly relaxed, and yet his heart continued to beat impossibly fast, he rose a hand up in front of his face and noticed it was shaking.

"Oh." He said aloud. It was if that was the floodgates had been opened and suddenly Lance was curling into himself, sobs ripping their way through his throat and causing him to gasp for air. No matter how hard he tried to suck down the oxygen that his body so desperately  needed, it was if he was rejecting it.

'You're having a panic attack.' He thought to himself, but the realization didn't help him.

This is what dying feels like.

*~*

The third time, much like the first, is one that he doesn't actually remember that well.

He has bits and pieces, flashes of memories of what might have happened and then he has clear memories of what actually did happen. He remembers thinking of Earth, of missing the blue skies and blueish-gray ocean waves. He remembers missing his family deeply, missing Marcos' teasing, Luis' dumb comments, Veronica's witty jibs, Gabi's dramatics, and maybe most of all, Rachel's warm smiles. He misses his parents too, and his abuelo and abuela, but at this point it wasn't as if he was actively missing them, more like something deep settling into his bones and dragging him down, down, down.

He can briefly remember yelling for Coran to watch out, but after that he can only remember blinding pain. He could feel searing pain in his back, it felt as if molten lava was being poured directly on his back, across his shoulder blades. He wanted to scream but his voice refused to listen, he tried to hear, hear if any help was coming but all he could hear was a loud ringing. He blinked slowly, eyes foggy. He could see Coran, or at least a Coran-shaped blob, but after that the colors all began to mix together, being indistinguishable.

'Sorry Mamá, I don't think I'm coming home.'

*~*

By the fourth time it was almost like he was expecting it.

They were at war, there was always bound to be rough situations but this one was almost just too much. He was alone, shielding Pidge as she continued to quickly hack away at the newest terminal that they were attempting to find information from.

They needed this success, there had already been too many failed attempts and too many dead ends. They needed to get this information, they needed a lead, an in in order to figure what the  _hell_ the empire was planning.

Hunk was further in front of him, holding steady support for Shiro and Keith, who were destroying the sentries as fast as they could, making sure to keep an eye our for each other. The only downside to this whole plan was that while everyone else had someone to watch out for them, Lance didn't.

"Guys I-" Lance was quickly cut off by Shiro.

"Keith, on your six!" Shiro shouted.

Keith nodded his head and quickly turned, stabbing cleanly through the sentry that was sneaking up on him.

"I-"

"Hunk, left!" Keith yelled, turning low to the ground and sweeping the sentry directly behind him off of his feet. Hunk turned, blasting the shots.

Lance narrowed his eyes at the horde of sentries before him, he couldn't bother the others, not when they were clearly just as overrun. "How ya doing back there Pidgy?" Lance asked.

Pidge quickly responded, "I still need a few dobashes, continue holding them off guys while I try to get this done as fast as I can. Something in their system isn't wanting to respond to my code so I'm going to have to do this manually." She spoke through her coms so that the rest of the team could hear.

Lance shot his eyes back towards the unending wave of sentries standing before him, all of their guns trained directly on him and Pidge.

"Guys," Lance's voice wavered, "I could really use some he-"

He saw the shots as if they were moving in slow motion, he saw the sentries press the triggers in synchronized motion, saw the flash at the barrels of their guns as the bolts of lights shot out.

His body moved on its own, one tick he was watching them pull the trigger, the next he was shielding Pidge. He had his arms wrapped securely around her smaller frame, body folded around her own as he felt the shots pierce into his already scarred back. He felt the bolts clearly, the pain agonizing, but they didn't go fully through his body.

'Finally something good.' He thought to himself, mind seemingly freezing at the pain that was currently blasting through his body. If only the pain would stop, but machines created to kill don't just stop shooting, even if their target might already be dead, not when there's still clearly an heat source right in front of them.

"L-Lance?" Pidge's voice faintly reached out to him. She slowly turned her head towards him, eyes widening in apparent horror as he attempted to smile weakly at her. "Lance!" She shouted, hastily moving and pulling her shield up to protect both herself and him.

"Lance is down, we need immediate e-vac!" Pidge shouted into the coms.

Lance coughed, feeling his throat be lubricated with something other than saliva. "Pidgy hey, no." He gasped out, "we need," he sucked in a gasp of air, "we need the information!"

"Lance?" He heard the panicked whisper through the coms, but in his current state there was no way he was going to be able to distinguish who actually muttered his name.

"Fuck the data!" Pidge whimpered, hunching over Lance, tears threatening to fall at any moment. "You're, you're so much more important than any information!"

Lance blinked lazily at her, and brought a hand up to rest on the side of her helmet. "Hey it's okay don't cry." He blinked a few more times, his breath hitching. "You remind me so much of Rachel it hurts." He smiled a watery smile at her. "You're going to find Matt I promise, introduce him to Blue for me, yeah? He sounds like good material."

"Good material?" Pidge whispered before realization dawned on her face. "Lance no! You are not going to die okay! You're going to survive this and you're gonna be your normal goofy self and you can't die you asshole!" Pidge was sobbing by this point, words slurring together.

"Sorry Pidgy," Lance muttered, eyes slowly beginning to slip shut. "I'm so tired."

He wasn't surprised when he woke up to the metallic sounds of the healing pod opening.

*~*

The fifth time really shouldn't have surprised him.

The mission was supposed to be a simple infiltration, just in and out quickly without arousing any suspicion from the Galra aboard the ship. Lance and Keith were the ones chosen for the job, since Lance could easily stay back in cover and support Keith while he ran around.

'Ran around doing his ninja bullshit.' Lance thought to himself, giving Keith a thumbs up while Keith smiled softly at him, almost a bit shy actually. Lance's eyes widened, and and quickly looked away, willing the blush currently on his cheeks to  _'please gtfo of my face!'_

"Remember guys, we want this to be quick and to be silent. No alarm trips, no alerting the guards, nothing. Just in and out okay?" Shiro said to them, hands on his hips and looking at the two as if they were children.

"Okay  _dad_." Lance whined. Shiro scoffed and rolled his eyes at the blue paladin. He looked back at Lance and smiled softly.

"Hey," He said, moving closer and placing a hand on Lance's left shoulder. "You be safe, and take care of Keith. You know how he is, no unnecessary actions okay?" Lance looked into the eyes of their leader. He could see the tiredness in them and knew they reflected into his own. None of them signed up for this war, none of them even signed up to be  _in_  a war and yet here they are. A bunch of kids just trying to do the right thing for the universe.

"Of course," Lance said before smirking over towards Keith. "you know you can trust me to keep that hothead in line."

"I take offense to that." Keith replied, crossing his arms.

"You were supposed to mullet," He shot a look back to Shiro, nodding his head slightly. "I believe we have some Galra ass to go kick!"

Shiro rose an eyebrow at him shaking his head slowly. 

"Put some GAC in the swear jar on your way out!" Pidge called from her chair in the debriefing room. Lance scrunched his nose and stuck his tongue out at her, causing her to simply roll her eyes. "Oh, and please be safe." She said quieter. Lance shot her a small smile and nodded his head, and like that, off he and Keith went. 

 

Lance groaned silently to himself. Why,  _why_  couldn't the universe just throw them a bone  _for once_  and let them save it! Of course things can never go as planned, of course it just had to be Lance that almost ruined the whole mission, oh wait, he  _did_  ruin the mission by setting off one of the small trip alarms. 

"It's official." He said to Keith, who at this particular moment was looking quite murderous at both Lance and the situation. "The universe actually  _wants_  me dead."

"Well how about we both focus on  _not_  dying, and you can just let Shiro and Allura lecture you when we get back." Keith shot back while peaking around the edge of the latest corridor they had ran down. 

"Hmm," Lance pretended to think for a moment before shooting Keith a side glance. "Is it to late to still accept the death thing instead?"

Keith turned quickly, marching up to Lance and pushing him into the wall roughly. 

"Dude what the fuck!" Lance exclaimed, back connecting roughly to the wall.

Keith towered over him, his expression was a mixture of anger and something else that Lance couldn't place. "Can you just stop it!"

"Stop what?!" Lance shouted back, confusion clear across his face.

"Stop joking about dying!" Keith yelled, ripping his helmet off of his head and holding it instead, "I get that it's some weird coping skill or whatever but knock it off! It fucking hurts to see you like that Lance and one of these days you're not going to get so lucky!" He was panting, his face was flushed and his gaze made Lance feel as if he was burning beneath a thousand suns. 

"Hey," Lance said softly, "I'm not going to die okay? I know I've had a few close encounters but it's okay. I'm here and you're gonna have to deal with it mullet." 

Keith paused, letting Lance's words sink in before he slowly nodded, "I think I can handle that." Lance smiled, basking in the uncharacteristically soft look in the red paladins eyes. 

"Well, now that we've discussed my coping mechanisms," Lance began, "let's figure out an escape out of her-" 

A Galra solider stood at the end of the corridor and they had been spotted. Lance froze as he took in the familiar sight of the blaster he was holding, could vividly remember the excruciating pain, could almost feel the bolts piercing him all over again. Thoughts swarmed his mind as it went into a panicked overdrive. 

"Lance?" Keith asked, taking in the fearful look in his partners eyes. He slowly turned and saw the Galran. "Oh."

Time seemed to move incredibly fast in the next few dobashes. Suddenly Keith and the solider were fighting, the blaster had been the first think Keith knocked away and now the two were locked in some extremely precise sword fight. 

Lance slowly brought a hand up to his helmet, activating his coms while continuing to watch the two fight, taking great detail in the fact that Keith hadn't put his helmet back on. "Requesting immediate e-vac. The mission had been compromised, engaging in enemy now." He heard the crinkle, the tell-tell signs that his message got back to the castle. 

Keith was punched across the head, a blow that normally wouldn't have been too bad,  _but he wasn't wearing his helmet._  Lance's mind helpfully supplied him. The solider laughed, stepping back to aim his sword and pierce through the thin protection the flight suits provided their stomachs. 

He moved without thinking, without planning. 

"No," He heard Keith whisper, and he felt pain in his stomach. 

He looked down.

"Huh," He said slowly, staring down at the sword that was now embedded into him, the blood that was slowly beginning to drip. "I've been impaled." It was then that Lance was painfully reminded that he never turned off his coms.

"Did you just quote frozen?" Hunk's tinny voice asked before realization set in. "Lance, buddy, brobama to my brobiden, please tell me you haven't actually been impaled."

Lance coughed, the familiar feeling of blood coating his throat coming back once again. Lance looked up, looking at the solider who seemed a purely gleeful. 

"Bang." He said dryly, all emotion completely gone from his voice as he raised his blaster and shot cleanly through the others heart. The solider dropped to the floor, it was a painless death. It was then that Lance's legs finally gave out. 

"Shit fuck, okay I have to stop the bleeding." Keith cursed, trying to remember just exactly they were taught to do in the Garrison in case of an impalement. He quickly went through his brain, searching for any information on what to do as Lance began to cough, blood splattering onto the ground. 

"Stay with me Lance, you said you wouldn't die so don't damn it!" Keith exclaimed. It was then that he remembered what he needed to do. "Lance, I-this is going to hurt but you need to let me do it okay?" Lance sluggishly nodded his head, breathing becoming shallower. 

Pain, blinding white agony as if someone was personally making it their life goal to torture him. "Stop!" Lance shouted, tears quickly forming and releasing all at once. His sobs and violent breathing filled the air as his eyes filled with fear. "Please stop please! it hurts, it hurts it hurts it hurts!" He begged. He could faintly hear choked gasps, couldn't focus past the intense pain. 

"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry please Lance." Keith repeated, almost like a mantra. "Lance, please, are your coms on?" 

He couldn't focus, couldn't exist with the blinding pain. His body was going numb and breathing was becoming harder to do in his panicked state. 

"Lance please!" Keith begged. Lance slowly blinked, eyes focusing on Keith's own violet. 

He smiled slowly. "You're so beautiful." 

Keith sucked in a harsh breath of air. "Lance are your coms on?" He repeated. Lance slowly nodded, continuing to stare at Keith with a look of wonder. "This is Keith to Castle. Requesting backup and assistance now. He's," Keith choked on a sob before trying again."He's not looking well and was stabbed with a sword. I'm applying pressure but he needs a healing pod now." 

"I never hated you." Lance spoke softly, looking at Keith through half-lidded eyes. "I only made up the rivalry cause I was jealous."

"Hey shush it's okay Lance. I know you don't hate me." Keith replied, fear taking over his normally calm expression. 

"I gotta," Lance paused, gasping for air. "tell you." 

Keith shook his head, while continuing to keep constant pressure on Lance's wound. "No no no, you can tell me when you get out of the pod okay."

"Don't got time," Lance whined weakly, vision blurring. "My favorite color is red. You looks so good in red, used to hate the color but now, its like," a gasp of air, "it's like my soul purpose."

"Lance stop talking like you're going to die! Help is on he way and we're going to get out of here, you're gonna make it back to Earth and you're gonna see your family again." Keith sobbed, tears freely flowing now. 

"I want to kiss you." Lance muttered, eyes slowly closing. 

"Hey, Lance no. Wake up!"

"Tired." Lance tried to say. His tongue felt heavy in his mouth, and his eyes refused to open. 

"Lance wake up, please!"

 

The pod whirled and the cycle continued.

*~*

His breathing was extremely shallow. He felt cold, so so cold. He slowly pried his eyes open, fighting against the urge to just fall asleep. Everything was so fuzzy, and cold. A bone deep cold. 

 **Oxygen Levels Depleted.**  His suit showed him. He blinked slowly, trying to process what his suit was telling him. He knew it was important, but he couldn't remember why. He couldn't think period. 

Everything hurt and yet it didn't. 

His ears were ringing loudly, and he was just so  _tired_. 

Surely just a quick rest wouldn't hurt.

**Author's Note:**

> If you enjoyed it lemme know! Leave a comment and kudos!
> 
> Stalk me:  
> twitter: lancexoltl (I have a twitter Au on here so come say hi!)  
> tumblr: enter-the-dragonface


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